Wednesday, 22 January 2014

Are We Reliant On The Internet?

In
today’s digital age we rely heavily on the internet through our work and our
play, we are connected by our phones, our computers and our tablets almost
anywhere that we go. If we aren’t connected by our 3G phone signal we may have
found a hot spot to quickly check our emails, or pulled up at a service station
along the motorway to catch a working break.

It
really is that simple because the internet is now very accessible to absolutely
everybody who has a Wi-Fi enabled device.

VirginMedia have posed a very interesting question to parent bloggers about the
importance of internet access for their everyday lives, and how different life
might be without it?

This got
me thinking about how regularly I actually use the internet and just how
important it actually is to me as an active blogger. The answer of course is
that without it… I wouldn’t be able to update this here blog and document Leo’s
journey the way that I do.

I do use
the internet regularly on the laptop in an evening when Leo is tucked up in
bed, But even when I am not on the laptop, my phone is connected all of the
time. It means that no matter where I am I will always be connected to the
world wide web (unless of course there is no phone signal…).

I can
remember a time when to be able to access the internet you had to dial up each
and every time you wished to use it, and even then it would dominate the entire
phone line the whole time you were logged on, meaning that no one could reach
anyone else on the phone while it was connected. It just goes to show how the
times have changed and now not only can you receive phone calls while online,
you can access it on many different kinds of devices from anywhere within your
home. Hands up if you are guilty to using your iPad… In the bath!?

I guess
it goes to show that I am pretty dependent upon the internet as I use it to
fuel my hobby. Without internet access I couldn’t manage my blog or add new
content to it. I wouldn’t be able to read the many blogs that I do, or
socialise with so many different people scattered around the globe.

The
internet has opened up so many possibilities to everyone who uses it, we can
find out what the news is and we can even discuss our opinions on the news in
online forums with likeminded people (or even the not so likeminded people…).
We can have a free video conversation with friends and family via Skype
anywhere in the world, whereas before the internet we would have had to settle
for a phone call and a hefty phone bill…

The more
I think about how much importance the internet holds to our everyday lives, the
more I realise that it has given us so much freedom and opportunity and we
would definitely miss it if it was to ever go away.

So I now
ask you this question..

What are
your views on the importance of internet access for your everyday lives, and
how different would your life be without it?